Khartoum – The war in Sudan is increasingly involving neighboring countries into the conflict. The Sudan Armed Forces , led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, have stepped up operations aimed at cutting the supply lines of the Rapid Support Forces , led by Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, known as “Hemedti,” which run through several neighboring countries.
The most serious incident occurred on August 21, when the SAF, using aircraft and drones, pursued and bombed an RSF convoy that had entered approximately 100 kilometers into Chadian territory.
Sudanese air strikes targeted an RSF convoy south of the border triangle between Sudan, Libya and Chad. According to the Sudanese army, the convoy consisted of around 200 combat vehicles coming from the Kufra camps in Libya. Khartoum claims that a supply chain originates in the United Arab Emirates, passes through Benghazi and Tobruk, and crosses the Libyan-Chadian border before reaching Darfur in western Sudan.
In response, the government in N’Djamena placed its troops on maximum alert and warned the Sudanese warring parties against extending the conflict across the border.
N’Djamena also reiterated that it reserves the right to defend its territorial integrity. In addition to the route from Libya through Chad into western Sudan, Sudanese authorities say there is another supply route running directly through Chadian territory. According to Khartoum, aircraft from the United Arab Emirates are stopping at at least two Chadian airports, Amdjaras and N’Djamena, to deliver supplies destined for the RSF, which are then transported overland to militia-controlled areas.
The Sudanese conflict now also involves Ethiopia, another country accused by Khartoum of supporting the RSF or, at the very least, of allowing its territory to be used for the supply of weapons. On August 23, a drone believed to have been launched from Ethiopia was shot down by the SAF in Blue Nile State, near Dindiro.
Images of the wreckage appear to show that the drone was armed with a Turkish-made laser-guided miniature munition and that the aircraft itself was also manufactured in Turkey. As early as May 23, the SAF had reported shooting down a Turkish-made drone near Ed Damazin, claiming that it had come from Ethiopia, which it accused of hosting a base from which such aircraft are launched .
Turkish drones are, in any case, widely used by the SAF themselves. The drone shot down in Blue Nile State was reportedly hit by Sudanese forces using a similar aircraft, also Turkish-made.
In an effort to contain the spread of the conflict, the United States has called on the UN Security Council to extend to the whole of Sudan the arms embargo currently in force for the Darfur region. “This Council should take measures to limit the fueling of the conflict, especially because external support also risks drawing regional actors and neighboring countries even deeper into the conflict in Sudan,” U.S. envoy Massad Boulos said during a meeting of the UN panel tasked with monitoring the Sudan war.
Boulos also called for the arms embargo to include drones and for the number of experts on the panel responsible for monitoring the implementation of sanctions to be increased.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.